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Thank you Sonic, I enjoyed talking with you too. Sorry I didn't get around to answering a couple of your posts to me. I'm not much of a multi tasker, lol. Maybe I'll get to them yet. I posted my very first thread the other day about getting used to the heat, and humidity in NC, and I am slow to answer.
I don't have any tattoos yet, but have always wanted some. Now for the agonizing over what kind, and where. I posted about a break before seeing your post about you taking a break. Although my ex wasn't physically violent I still feel betrayed, and broken. My daughter says to just get over it, and move on, but that is hard to do. I got a post deleted elsewhere on c-d, and a warning, and my brain cell feels like it's exploding. So a break is in order I think before I mess up more. It kind of feels like ptsd in a small way, like being under attack still. So glad you found a nice BF. It gives me hope even at my age (o;. Hugs ~ Claudia
And some people with opinions outside of the mainstream are labeled as trolls for voicing them
Depends on how far out of the mainstream we're talking. You have to admit that if you had someone going on a tirade about how the Earth is flat, some people might be inclined to wonder if the person is serious, crazy, or just trolling for a reaction.
I think it's 100% about status. Someone gains status through influence. They misunderstand the nature of influence, assuming that it's zero-sum, and that diminishing someone's contribution is the same thing as providing that contribution in the first place. This is why a troll trolls.
In most cases, they're driven by their own lack of real ability to contribute. They're not able to be funny, or punchy, or insightful, and are supremely jealous of those who are.
Let's say someone posts a comment. If the comment is coherent and meaningful, insightful in some way, offers information or helps to define meaning, it generates influence and provides status to the poster. Trolls think of status as zero-sum, in the sense that if someone is gaining influence, they must therefore be losing influence. So they take the OP's post as diminishing them, a form of attack. To defend themselves, they must lash out to sustain their influence state. That lashing out will include things like ad hominem attacks, irrational off-topic rants, deliberate misreadings, and sly innuendo-laced derogatory remarks - anything they think will offset the status the original poster gained by making their post.
They're also acutely aware of high-profile posters who have developed a certain influence and authority within a particular online community. By counting coup on a high-status individual, they feel they gain a disproportionate amount of status in return.
This is the distinction between trolling and over-the-top opinionated posting. Usually an opinionated poster will direct comments to a topic. They may provide evidence, commentary, or perspective, because their rhetorical purpose is to establish or refute a position. The troll directs comments based on a wholly different rhetorical purpose - to diminish the person who posted. So they'll comment to attack the authority of the OP, they'll comment to attack their message or their meaning. They'll claim the OP was irrelevant, irrational, incoherent, unhinged in some way, because their objective isn't to argue the point, but to knock the ground out from the OP.
Then when the trolling behavior generates a certain amount of ill will, the troll takes the ill will as evidence that they've gained status as an influencer. They've "set things straight" or "put that uppity-so-and-so in their place," and restored the status balance to where it was before the OP's post. They get a disproportionate amount of satisfaction from the disruption, because it ensures that nobody has an opportunity to build status - everything turns into a comment to or about the troll, and any attempt to get back on topic will be greeted by more trolling.
They're irrational in this way, maybe even vaguely sociopathic, because they're motivated by the emotional response, not by usual human measures in a community such as acceptance or agreement. They assume the OP was posting from their motivation as well, just to get that emotional response - so in some ways they see *everyone* posting as some kind of troll.
Say someone posts on a controversial thread like vaccination debate ... they don't attack anyone's post, they simply post all of their own reasons for being cautious about vaccinations (a non-mainstream opinion).
Then that post is met with a barage of hateful accusations of child abuse, threats of having their children taken away. They are called ignorant, stupid, selfish, conspiracy theorist = mob mentality.
It's called a debate, but it's truly a one-sided argument and dissenters be damned! Both sides are not given equal respect. One is shot down and trampled under so severely, that others who are against vaccinations are afraid to post their views.
Depends on how far out of the mainstream we're talking. You have to admit that if you had someone going on a tirade about how the Earth is flat, some people might be inclined to wonder if the person is serious, crazy, or just trolling for a reaction.
If they post something outside of the mainstream but don't back it with facts or logic, I'd still consider them a troll. But i see plenty of people with unpopular beliefs try to logically back them, even if their logic is incorrect but i won't consider them trolls for trying honestly.
Say someone posts on a controversial thread like vaccination debate ... they don't attack anyone's post, they simply post all of their own reasons for being cautious about vaccinations (a non-mainstream opinion).
Then that post is met with a barage of hateful accusations of child abuse, threats of having their children taken away. They are called ignorant, stupid, selfish, conspiracy theorist = mob mentality.
It's called a debate, but it's truly a one-sided argument and dissenters be damned! Both sides are not given equal respect. One is shot down and trampled under so severely, that others who are against vaccinations are afraid to post their views.
Is that trolling behavior?
Some regular posters can be worse than "trolls". The mob mentality is pretty bad online, when a group of people gang up on a particular poster. I was accused of taking up for a rapist by a group of people online who twisted something I said. Not here on CD, but elsewhere. My advice is, stop posting to them and leave.
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